☕️ S&C Daily — Face the Sun

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A new amendment would cap what college coaches can be paid at $5 million a year. It would only apply to contracts signed after it becomes law, so every current deal stays as it is.

That’s well below the top of the market. All 10 of the highest paid coaches in college football are set to make more than double it in 2026, led by Indiana’s Curt Cignetti at $13.02 million. Georgia’s Kirby Smart and LSU’s Lane Kiffin are at $13 million apiece. The language covers any varsity sport, so men’s basketball falls under the same ceiling.

Senators Cory Booker and Chris Murphy filed it as a change to the Protect College Sports Act. It is one of more than 35 amendments filed to that bill, and most have little chance of being accepted.

A new study in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research tracked 18 male sprinters at top speed using 10 cameras and seven force plates built into the track, then checked which measurements best explained how fast they actually ran.

Force beat form. How much each sprinter braked on contact and how hard he pushed down into the ground explained more of the difference in season’s bests than stride length, joint angles or step timing. Braking was also the only force measure tied to top-speed time.

For coaches without force plates, the authors say three things can stand in: stride length, contact time and support angle.

If you missed Rich Burnett's summer cohort, Building an Assessment System returns Oct 9. Six live weeks, 30 coaches, $799 paid once. Weeks 1 through 3 settle the framework: which tests earn floor time, how to score them honestly, how that score changes what an athlete actually gets programmed. Weeks 4 through 6 you build the app itself, on your own athletes, in a repo under your own name.

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Science for Sport’s James de Lacey shared three tips for delivering a team session more effectively. The first is where players stand. They should all be in front of the coach instead of in the usual circle around him, which makes it easier to talk to the whole group at once.

The second is the sun. Players shouldn’t be looking into it while they take instruction, so the coach faces it instead, even when that’s uncomfortable. The third is the seam between the warm-up and training. There shouldn’t be a noticeable divide, so any excessive stretching and dynamic work gets done on the players’ own time beforehand.

President Trump will be at Saturday’s Texas-Tennessee game, and Steve Sarkisian says that changes one thing for his staff. Any time the president enters, leaves or moves within the stadium, all communications get cut, including coach-to-coach headsets and the speaker in the helmet. “You get no warning, so that just gets cut out,” Sarkisian said. He last coached through it at Alabama in 2019.

Syracuse hired Marty Lauzon as senior associate athletic director for integrated health, wellness and sports performance, overseeing athletic training, strength and conditioning, sports nutrition and mental health. Lauzon spent 21 years in the NFL, including eight as the Falcons’ director of sports medicine and performance, and has also run performance departments for the Atlanta Hawks and Pittsburgh Penguins. He started Sept. 21.

“Syracuse got themselves a real heavy hitter,” said Commanders head coach Dan Quinn, who worked with him in Atlanta.

The Dallas Mavericks have named Nico Berg executive director of health and performance. Berg is a physiotherapist with experience across the NBA, NFL and NHL.

The University of Tampa hired Alec Petrocelli as an assistant strength and conditioning coach.

Our NSCA approved AI course for strength coaches is out now. Six modules on using AI for the documentation, reporting and admin that eats your week.

Self paced. Most coaches finish it in an afternoon. No technical background needed. Earn CEUs and get a certificate of completion with your name on it.

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